One Hundred Percent
by letsbehappy
Summary: TROYELLA. Oneshot. Protecting his girlfriend against her own self-pity, Troy attempts to hide the proof of how he actually beat her at academics.


**100% :) Good job, Troy!**

One hundred percent.

His mark was circled, in red, adjacent to two dots above a curved line and followed by an underlined, positive note from the hardest teacher you'll ever find within the walls of East High.

He glanced over at Gabriella's test.

**84%**

Not circled. No smiley face or uplifting comment in sight.

"The majority of you did very—I'm sorry to say—poorly," barked Mr. Doris from the front of the room,"but remember class, this test was worth fifteen percent of your grade!"

And with that he left. All the groaning students filed after him seeing as the last period of the day had ended.

Troy squinted his eyes, checking his mark once again, checking to see if it was actually his test and checking his answers to see if they were correct. He even resorted to pinching himself to see if it were true.

His frowning girlfriend asked him, "What did you get, Wildcat?"

"I—um—uh—you see..." Troy stuttered while vividly recalling a past incident where Gabriella had spent days, literally, mourning over her 85% mark. And a mourning Gabriella equals an untouchable Gabriella. The only exception was if you wanted to kiss her while she cried and intently studied exactly where she had made her mistakes. If Troy showed her his flawless test, he wouldn't know how many Gabriella-less weeks he'd be able to take.

"Hey hoops, did you fail Doris' test too?" yelled Chad, waving his 22% mark for everyone to see.

Beside him, Taylor complained, "Oh my God. It should be illegal for teachers to make students write tests that hard. I studied for weeks and still had trouble. What did you get, Gabriella?"

"Eighty-four percent, you?"

"Hey we got the same grade!"

"If the two braniacs of the class got that then I might just have beaten the class average," Chad remarked, "You still haven't told us what you got, Troy. Is it that bad?"

Both Gabriella and Taylor offered him sympathetic smiles.

"Um, I just need to ask Mr. Doris something about my test. See you later!" said Troy, hurrying to catch up with the teacher.

"It's okay! Don't worry, we understand how embarrassing it is. Just don't get kicked off the team!" called his bushy-haired friend after him.

-----

"Mr. Doris!" exclaimed Troy, trying to get his stout, balding teacher's attention.

"Yes, Troy?"

He waved his test in front of Mr. Doris' face. "Did I really get a perfect score on this?"

"Yes, Troy," the man confirmed, "I was impressed. You did a terrific job."

Terrific? No way. Not him. Not Troy who was very accustomed to his B average.

"You're sure?"

"I'm certain."

"Can you...can you check it over again?"

"Why Troy, you just got the best mark out of the whole class. Shouldn't you be happy and, uh, telling me that it's 'off the hook'?" asked Mr. Doris, "Unless you have something to say to me. Is the guilt eating away at you, making you want to confess that you've in fact cheated?"

"No! No, not at all. I studied really hard for this."

"Then you should be a normal student and go frame it or something," Mr. Doris said with a wave of his hand, dismissing a befuddled Troy.

-----

Troy joined an awaiting Gabriella at her locker.

She teasingly inquired, "Manage to convince Mr. Doris to give you extra marks?"

"That's not what I wanted to talk to him about."

"Why did you rush after him then?"

"It doesn't matter."

"You're sure? You can talk to me about your mark, you know. I can help you study for the next test," she suggested.

"Now?" No way was he going to spend his only free afternoon of the week with Gabriella doing school work.

"Why not? I could use the extra studying too." He couldn't believe her.

"Uh, I don't need help. I only had to talk to Mr. Doris because...because my father wanted to know when the next faculty meeting was. But you can still come over to my house. We'll walk," Troy told the truth, only slipping in a little lie.

"Okay, let's go."

They strolled to Troy's house, dumping their backpacks in the entrance.

"Gabi, do you want to go and play basketball with me?"

"Uh...sure? Don't go too hard on me, alright?" she agreed.

Half an hour later, the score was Bolton: 1, Montez: 22.

Gabriella questioned, "Troy, I said don't go too hard on me, not play like a two year old. Is there anything wrong?"

"Nothing, I'm just so glad I taught you so well." He beamed at her. "And I'm so not jealous, at all, that you beat me so badly at my own game."

The petite brunette frowned. "You're sure everything's okay?"

"Yes, what would be wrong?"

"You've been acting weird ever since we got Mr. Doris' test back."

"No I haven't."

"Troy, during our one on one game, you passed me the ball an encouraged me to shoot."

"That's because I love you and I don't mind that I lost."

After pausing, she spoke again. "You got a higher grade than me on the test didn't you?" There was his genius girlfriend he knew.

"W-what? No. Pfft. Course not."

"What did you get, Troy?"

"I don't have to tell you if I don't want to."

"What did you get?"

"One hundred percent."

The orange basketball resting in her hands almost went flying through his window.

"What?! Let me see!"

They went back into the house and he showed her.

Gabriella threw her arms around him in an embrace. "Congratulations, wildcat! Why didn't you show me earlier? I thought you'd be bragging nonstop in Chad's face."

"Well I didn't think you'd believe me. I didn't believe it myself. That's why I ran to catch up to Mr. Doris."

"And when you found out it was really true?"

"I didn't want..."

"For me to become that blubbering mess again?"

"Kind of, yeah. It sucks seeing you cry over something as worthless as a test."

"Aw, that's so sweet. But I'd never get mad at you for getting a high mark, Troy, because I love you too."

"What went wrong on that test anyways? I thought you and Taylor studied for weeks."

She shrugged. "I dunno what happened with Taylor, but I guess just messed up while writing it."

"Distracted by a certain gorgeous basketball star sitting in front of you?"

"Oh please. You wouldn't have even picked up a textbook if you didn't get to come over to study with me every night."


End file.
